SELLING TRAVEL by SMP Training Co

THE E-MAGAZINE THAT FOCUSES ON THE REALITY OF SELLING TRAVEL

PLUS The O&M The EDGE The Frontline The BDM

FEBRUARY 2012

In this issue

EDITORIAL

THE O&M – Developing Your Niche Sales Plan

It seems to be that those who are entrenched in selling and servicing a niche product are doing very well. If that’s true world wide than perhaps this is a proven strategy to follow as opposed to being all things to all people. As the world turns some niche markets no longer function as the consumer migrates away from the niche destination or activity. When this happens you must invoke the Power of Three, which means you offer three variations of your niche, so if one is no longer popular, you’ll have two others that are. When you can, click to my new website and sign up, join the ST Community. Also check for the FREE webinars this month. Don’t forget, if you need help with anything you see in Selling Travel I am as close as your email or Skype button.

Best regards, Steve Crowhurst, CTM Publisher www.sellingtravel.net steve@sellingtravel.net www.facebook.com/sellingtravel Skype: smptraining1 T: 250‐752‐0106

THE FRONTLINE – Selling The Agency’s Niche Program THE EDGE – Niche Travel is a Home Run! CORY ANDRICHUK – How Could SM Support a Niche Market? THE EXTREME BDM – Look For The Niche Within Your Brand CHOOSING YOUR NICHE – Which One? THE LIST OF 200+ NICHES – How To Choose One THE POWER OF 3 – Your Plan B HUNTING FOR ANCESTORS – Who Do You Think You Are? THE ADVENTURE NICHE – The Stable Niche THE CRUISE NICHE – The Not‐So‐Stable Niche DESTINATION FOCUS NICHE – A Choice of 195

Selling Travel is owned and published by Steve Crowhurst, SMP Training Co. All Rights Reserved. Protected by International Copyright Law. Selling Travel can be shared, forwarded, cut and pasted but not sold, resold or in anyway monetized. Using any images or content from Selling Travel must be sourced as follows: “Copyright SMP Training Co. www.smptraining.com” SMP Training Co. 568 Country Club Drive, Qualicum Beach, BC, Canada V9K 1G1 Note: Steve Crowhurst is not responsible for outcomes based on how you interpret or use the ideas in Selling Travel or on the Selling Travel Website.

editorial

IF YOU ARE NOT SELLING A NICHE PRODUCT YOU COULD BE LOSING OUT ON THE LATEST CRAZE THAT’S BEEN GOING ON SINCE THE VICTORIANS WENT ON THE GRAND TOUR…

I always love to read the trade headlines when they announce this niche or that niche as the fastest growing. If you paid attention and reacted to each of these headlines you’d be in a non‐stop spin wondering what to do. One thing you must always do, is due diligence. That way you will not be caught out by investing in a short term blip. When it comes to niche markets you must dig deep and search for the stats and facts in your area unless you pull business from further afield such as from around the country you live in or from around the world. He fastest route to primary information is always your existing clients. Check in with them to find out if there is a market for your new niche product idea. Your next step is to market the idea locally and again test what the reaction is. In this issue of Selling Travel I will tell you more about how to market your niche, offer you over 250 niche ideas and address a couple of stable niche markets such as Soft Adventure – and I’ll have you think about a niche within a niche. We have ‘The Coach’ – Cory Andrichuk of brandUcoaching back with a great article this month so be sure to read Cory’s page. Let me know what you need! Creatively Yours!

Steve Crowhurst Author, Trainer, Columnist, Keynote Speaker, Publisher and world traveller.

We’re still on Concordia time and the media is not letting go of this at the moment. If cruising is your niche then you’ll need to create your script for when a client asks about the safety of cruising. Make sure you know what you are talking about and never be flippant with your response. Again, make absolutely sure you have the facts and figures you need so no one can come back to you later on to challenge your advice. Make sure you have instructed your agency team also. Do not leave them to think up their responses on the spot. Script everyone. Be sure to sell travel insurance to every cruise client. Not to do so is pure negligence, and that’s going to steer you into litigation.

As the agency owner, manager you would probably have put a few years into your business and your career and over that time you would have no doubt developed a liking, an interest, a passion for one or more different destinations, activities or type of trip. If you have this happening to you then it’s a sign that you have something you could call your niche. Your special interest, and the very thing that might just launch you into a new round of revenue generation. Some agency owners and managers never take advantage of their years of knowledge and their own passion and some do. If you would like to make some moola on your own know‐how then you’ll need a plan. The riches are in the niches you’ve read that before and then additional riches are in the niche within the niche! Have you heard that one? Perhaps not. What it means is that within every niche there are additional niche markets you can develop. But let’s stay with your prime special interest. Step 1: Your Prime Special Interest This term refers to the special interest you know most about. Step 2: Do You Actually Know? Here’s the challenge when you profess to know a travel specialty. A client would think if you profess to know Italy ‘like the back of your hand’ that you are fluent in Italian, know where to go in terms of side streets, where to shop etc. It’s important to use the right words when describing or marketing your level of expertise. Step 3: Show Me The Proof Next you’ll want to have solid proof that you do know about your special interest. That can be accommodated through photographs and video of you being there, doing that thing, guiding that tour and so on. Proof equals credibility.

Step 4: Planning Your Plan You must do your due diligence especially in terms of the number of people who are interested in your travel passion. If you intend to create a new series of wine tours, you know that wine & food travel is big business. But where do they go? Obviously to where the grapes are grown and the wine produced. Now check online for similar tours to the one you are planning. What’s the competition like? Who are they? Are they in your neck of the woods? Religious travel is big. What faith are you? Do you care? Would you tour with anyone of any faith? Once again, where to? Next thing to think about is the best season for travelling… and then the best month or months for marketing. No matter the niche, you must have enough lead in time so that the client has time to ponder and make a buying decision. Now we come to the marketing fund. How much are you willing to invest in your marketing campaign? Remember if you dabble and just stick your toe in, you will more than likely crash and burn! If you cannot afford to fund your marketing then learn how to use social media. In addition use your email. Study how you can generate interest through radio interviews, TV interviews, local newspaper articles and media releases. Plan the plan!

SELLING THE AGENCY’S NICHE TOUR PROGRAM It’s always tough selling someone else’s passion. Been there done that and I know for a fact, if it’s not your interest, you can never get behind it as the person with the passion does. That said, it is possible to rise to the challenge and study the passion, the niche and overcome the lack of enthusiasm for selling it.

If the order of the day to sell a certain destination or type of travel or deal with a specific supplier – none of which you like or care to sell with any flair then there is a way that you can overcome this malady and at the same time contribute to the common good of the agency. In my experience, if you only know a little bit about something you struggle each time to answer a question or advise an interested client. On the other hand, also from my experience, if you bite the bullet and study up to the level of expert then you will be able to take on all comers and answer their questions, too, without having to dive into the filing cabinet or rummage around the internet. You’ll never have the passion for this niche unless it truly is your passion – however you will be able to sell it with a knowledgeable smile and that key word knowledge is the answer. So get out the maps. Study the itinerary. Get online to investigate the route and find out the history of the area. Frontline Font: PlazaPUit

What if your agency owner says, “Hey, we’re going to be starting a niche based on family travel for families hailing from islands of the Caribbean”. Say what! There are some 40+ islands located in the Caribbean which means you have some work to do! Your self‐study program will lead you to the Caribbean Specialist training program and if you wish to go a little deeper you will also find many of the individual islands have created their own Specialist programs. Your agency manager is an outdoor enthusiast. One Monday morning the manager walks in, says, “Hi!” followed by “guess what we’re going to start selling?” This statement is followed by the words “ADVENTURE TRAVEL!” What do you do now? Well you ask who, what, where, when, how and then you start researching the CATS program, then other Adventure Specialist programs and any other program that your preferred suppliers are creating just for you. Then there’s your very own niche that you would like to start pushing. As you’ve read here, before you can claim you have a niche you have to show you know. Having travelled to Hawaii ten times does not mean you have a niche or that you are a specialist. Work with your manager to build the base you need and then come out selling!

YES! IT’S UP AND RUNNING AND ACCESSIBLE RIGHT NOW. SO CLICK THERE WHEN YOU CAN AND USE WHATEVER YOU CAN FIND. SHARE IT WITH YOUR COLLEAGUES AND SEND IN ANY QUESTIONS YOU HAVE ABOUT SELLING TRAVEL. YOU’LL FIND SOME OLD FAVOURITES AND A FEW NEW PAGES TOO. ENJOY!

www.sellingtravel.net The SELLING TRAVEL webpage will eventually take over from the SMP TRAINING Co. website which will operate but become more focused on developing training modules, presentations and keynote speeches. The SELLING TRAVEL website and SELLING TRAVEL eMagazine will compliment each other and offer travel agency managers and staff a continuous flow of no fluff, street savvy sales and marketing “how‐to”. If you can help build the selling travel community it would be greatly appreciated by letting your agency colleagues and head office management team know about it.

CLICK FOR: q q q q q q q q q q q

How To Sell Tips, Tools and Techniques Social Media Info and How‐To Niche and Specialty Travel Marketing Videos and Surveys Free PowerPoint Training Links Webinars E‐Books and Handouts Downloads Articles On Selling Travel Find Your Favourites: The Edge, The O&M, The Frontline and The BDM all here in the Selling Travel E‐Magazine

What would YOU like to sell? As a home‐based independent contractor you have virtually no one to tell you what to do, sell or market. So with the door wide open, walk through it and out into the sunshine of a niche that might just make you more money than you ever thought possible. If you are new to travel and have not travelled too much, too far, then you can still research based on a business decision versus your travel passion and choose the niche that seems to be generating interest amongst the client segment you would like to work with. For instance: soft adventure travel seems to be dominated by women, cruising (depending on the class of ship and pricing) is dominated by middle aged couples. So this requires a bit of digging around to find the niche that best suits you, where you are located and your skills in using the Internet for your promotional purposes. Your skill at creating stand alone websites and Facebook business pages will also help you establish your niche and attract customers from all walks of life to your site / page / account. What is your passion at this time? Whatever it is, there are others who want to do it too. Just remember there is isn’t too much that’s new in the world of travel, but there be a new way to present it, or perhaps you can add something different to an old niche. The Edge Font: Baby Kruffy

I’m looking for real‐time challenges that stop you from being the best you can be. Be sure to include your email and website links. Thanks! One of the BEST things about selling a niche market and being home based is that YOU can go along on each and every tour if you have the time and funds to do so. With that in mind, you can and you should develop your niche departures around what YOU like to do and the places YOU would like to visit and or the places YOU know so very well. When you start to focus on what you want to see and do, you enter the world of Come With Me and The President’s Tour style of marketing. Here’s an idea of what your ad layout might look like as you promote your “COME WITH ME!” tours to that special place you want to visit and share. If you are from another country and now want your clients to visit “home” with you, make sure you keep it strictly business. Your clients will not want to mix with your Great Aunt Nelly and her twenty cats! On the other hand, if that’s the name of the tour and you sold to a cat lovin’ crowd, then all the power to ya!

GUEST ARTICLE FROM

CORY ANDRICHUK

HOW could social media support a niche market!?!? The short answer is well… so many easy, low cost, and high return ways. Let me simply outline the steps below with Facebook as a business social media tool example, and then remind and recommend that with enough patience and perseverance, you should, overtime, receive some credible business inquires that pertain to your target niche market… So let’s get started! The short answer is well… so many easy, low cost, and high return ways. Let me simply outline the steps below with Facebook as a business social media tool example, and then remind and recommend that with enough patience and perseverance, you should, overtime, receive some credible business inquires that pertain to your target niche market… So let’s get started! 1. Sign‐up for a Facebook Like page at facebook.com, and complete the profile 100%. Chop Chop! 2. Invite all your Facebook friends to “Like” your page, (no Facebook friends = no problem, as step 3 presumes that some of your clients are on Facebook and will “Like” your page!) 3. Email your updated database, friends, and colleagues to “Like” your page. Write to them saying… I have just created a business Facebook ‘Like’ page and have done it with you in mind. Several times a week I will be posting information that you can use immediately. I am creating a community to help you plan, research, think, share, laugh and ultimately save time and money on your next dream vacation! Please click here to get to my page and then press the “Like” button at the top to join my community. I promise you will enjoy it and value from it. All my best, Suzzy Sue, MCC, CTC, River Cruising & Travel Expert. Click to this link… www.facebook.com/mytravelagencynamegoeshere 4. Focus (80% of the time!) mainly on writing every day, engaging material that pertains to your niche, travel in general, entertaining and global issues, humorous and stimulating ideas/ thoughts, You Tube video’s that capture your niche’s emotion and other video that makes your fans laugh.

6. Ensuring you have many “Call’s To Action”, in many creative ways, that educates your fans HOW you PERSONALLY do business differently. Please ensure they can, and know HOW to call you on the phone, SKYPE you, and email. The long answer starts with asking yourself what IS your niche! River cruising? Northern European Castle and Pub crawls (Call me if you do!), Caribbean Honeymoon Cruise and All‐Inclusives? Once a niche market is chosen, or it chooses you as it sometimes does in the travel industry, you begin the strategy of positioning you and your services accordingly in front of your target market. This strategy includes both traditional marketing (business cards, professional networking, tele‐sales, direct‐mail/ postcards and consumer nights) as well as the new online business social media marketing. Contact me directly to help you integrate both and better understand how to make business social media work for you! brandUcoaching Inc. is a highly‐specialized travel business coaching practice that inspires and motivates home‐based entrepreneurs HOW to both start and grow their business. Call me #1855 BUY CORY (289 2679) Follow me @branducoach coryandrichuk.com facebook.com/brandUcoaching

On this page we enhance the sales relationship between supplier BDMs and the travel agent. Outcome: faster, quicker, larger, higher revenue sales!

HERE’S A TEST OF AN EXTREME BDM. HOW MANY NICHE MARKETS ARE THERE WITHIN YOUR PRODUCT RANGE THAT A TRAVEL AGENT COULD SELL? START COUNTING. THE ANSWER COULD BE YOUR ROUTE TO THAT NEXT LEVEL OF BONUS! As a practising BDM and an Extreme one at that, you should know instantly the niche market potential within your brands and how to advise your accounts to take advantage of these opportunities. When an agency goes niche they are committing time and money and human resources to push market your brand in a direction that might be more unique than generic. As and when this happens, you’ll probably need to step up and learn a little more about the agent’s niche and how to support them. That said, it might be that head office doesn’t “get it” and says no to the co‐op funding or joint marketing, or those 100 DVDs the agent was asking for. Fact is when an agency account does step outside the usual lines and decides to take your product into a new niche this is something to celebrate. More than a few tour operators have picked up a new idea from a creative travel agent. So now back to the number of niche markets to be found within your product range and destinations. Is it possible that your product can support the weddings and honeymoon niche? How about the full A to Z of adventure travel? Let’s ask about wine tours and religious tours, culinary, sports, singles…? Perhaps it would be a good idea for you to review the page listing 250 niches markets and check off the ones that you can accommodate. BDM Font: Baily

It might be that you yourself have a passion for a type of travel that you have enjoyed with your own company. Let’s suggest you like the outdoors and you like photography and you have, in the past, taken a tour with your own company and pursued your passion enroute. At first glance a travel agent may not realize or “see” the opportunity of an all‐inclusive resort in Mexico being able to offer, or serve as the base, for a niche group of hikers or bird watching photographers. With your help they would. All you have to do is ask each of your accounts, “What is your travel passion?” When you hear their answer and judge your products to be a fit – you then advise them that if they got behind their own passion / niche to build groups for you, that you would then support their efforts. Just as a travel agent should ask their clients about their dream trips and interests you must do the same with your client list – your agency accounts. If you invite these agents on a FAM, then during that FAM you carve out one full day to help each agency owner manager on the FAM to create their niche specialty whilst onsite at the destination or resort, or onboard ship or on the jungle trek. So that’s your mission if you choose to accept it. Study the niche markets to be sold within the framework of your own products. Do you feel that bonus happening yet?

Remember the BDM Mantra: “If I can’t sell it to them… they won’t sell it for me!”

There are well over 250 different niche markets for you to consider, PLUS if you were to go for a niche destination, another 195 or more (countries/destinations) to add to that 250 ‐ and then you also have 12 months and different seasons not to mention the target audience variables ranging from seniors to Gen Y and everyone in between. As you can now imagine, choosing a niche market takes planning. The secret to choosing a niche, is to focus on the things you like to do and the places you like to visit. Better still if you know a place like the back of your hand, speak the language, know the culture and know the special places that are safely off‐the‐beaten‐ track. If your niche is an activity like photography, or belly dancing, or rock climbing or visiting museums then to maximize your revenue you’ll want to be able to state that you are an “expert” in your field. Let’s take cruising for instance. If this is your niche and you have cruised 10 times then you have the experience that first time cruisers would be seeking. If you have cruised 75 times even better. Now, if you have cruised 25 times to Mexico or the Caribbean and completed a variety of itineraries on a variety of ships operated by different cruise lines… well now, you are definitely worth talking to aren’t you. Add to your cruise history one or two certificates such as your MCC and now look at you. You have cruise experience and you have letters after your name, too. That is a powerful combination. Back to choosing your niche. You can see the difference in a travel agent pitching a niche based on “I’ve cruised twice!” versus “I am a certified cruise professional and hold my Master Cruise Counsellor certification. In addition I have cruised on 25 different ships operated by 5 of the best cruise lines. I specialize in the Caribbean.” Now you must drill down through your experience to decide just what it is you are a specialist in. If there’s nothing happening for you at this very moment that’s okay because on the next page I’ll tell you how to invent a niche that you can start selling within 30 days.

CREATING A NICHE IN 30 DAYS This is going to be painful. You head is going to hurt and your mouse is going to croak! If you want this you have to work for it. Here goes: Step 1: Write down every country you have travelled to. Write down every place visited. Add up all the flights you’ve taken, cruises cruised, and all other journeys too. Step 2: Start dreaming. Where in the world would YOU like to send YOU? Call it your personal bucket list if you wish. Step 3: Find a red pen. Now circle what is repetitive amongst what you have written down. Look for linkages. Dig deep as to what made you want to visit the places you have already seen and think about what’s driving you to fulfill your bucket list dream trips. Step 4: The short list is forming. Now you want to drill down to say three activities, one to three destinations / countries and preferred modes of transportation. Think about seasons too – when do you prefer to travel? Step 5: At this stage let’s say, (I’ll use my own interests to demonstrate what you have in front of you) you enjoy photography as an activity, your favourite country is Japan, place would be Kyoto and spring time is the season you prefer. You now have a niche market you can package and sell.

If this doesn’t work for you, then you’ll be making a business decision based on the most trendiest niche that’s growing, selling fast and generating large revenues. Whether you like the trend or the destination may not matter, as long as it generates revenues for you. So what niche markets are growing fast and or about to take off? Well you could Google that or you could check the local press for travel ads. What is everyone else selling?

TRAVEL TRENDS 2012 Perhaps a trend to take a hard look at would be the luxury market. Here’s a link to click to and at that link you might just find what you are looking for. http://www.luxurytravelmagazine.com/news‐ articles/top‐travel‐trends‐for‐2012‐16403.php I have to say, that any activity in the world today can be turned into a travel trend and tourism opportunity. Every department of tourism is looking for that next golden trend which will attract the world to their country. Perhaps your next million is not based on clients flying out and overseas, but visitors flying in to your neck of the woods. This is called Inbound Tourism and if you do this right, you can sometimes tap into local source funding initiatives. The breakdown would be national government, local government, hotel groups & associations, retail councils and associations… all these groups initiate funding to help attract the inbound visitor. If you create something that visitors will visit for and come back to do it again, then you might have a winner on your hands.

Once you’ve decided on your own niche, spend time with your agency team and find out what they like to sell. You might have counsellors on your team that are skiers for instance. Well right there is a non ‐ stop growing trend. WHAT ARE THE TRENDS AMONGST YOUR CLIENTS? Hey we can’t forget the people that pay your way! Why not ask your clients about their trends and what they want to do and then look at that information and see if there’s a trend forming. Is there a niche that’s growing in that client list of yours? Chances are the answer is YES! Then again you could always create a niche market by focus selling one of your preferred suppliers. If this works for you, which supplier would it be?

“Everyone says, start a niche market… but which one? This is not as easy as I was told!” If your brain is on fire with trying to decide which and what niche to start, start here and plod through this list of more than 250 potential niche markets. Some you will know, others are whacky and some are tried and true. What’s important is whether or not you have the knowledge to make this work. Experience is key here.

OVER 250 NICHE MARKETS ATV/Watercraft Rental Abseiling Academic Aerobics African Heritage Agriculture Air Charter Air Safari Air Shows Airlines Airport Transfers All‐inclusive Packages Adventures Anthropology Antiques Apartment/Condo Archeology Architecture Art History Art General Artists' Workshops Astrology Astronomy Auto Racing Auto Rentals Backpacking Ballooning Barging Baseball Basketball Bear Watching Bed & Breakfast Beer/Brewery/Pub Tours Biblical Tours Bicycle Touring Bird watching Botany Boxing Broadway Shows Bullfighting Bungee Jumping Business Traveler Tours Butterfly/Lepidoptery Camel Safaris Camping Canal Cruising Canoeing/Kayaking Canyoning Castles/Palaces Cattle Breeding Cattle Cutting, Roping Cattle Drive Cave Art Caving Character Tours Chauffeured Tours Children Permitted Chocolate Tours Christian Tours Christmas Tours Church Tours Cigar Tours City Packages Civil War Clans Clothing Optional Clown Tours Coffee Tours Collectors Tours College Bowls Conference Conservation

Cooking School Corporate Events Country Houses Country Inns Covered Wagons Crafts Cruises Cultural Culinary Dance Desert Design Tours Dhow Sailing Dialysis Cruises Dirt Bike Rentals Doctors'/Nurses' Tours Dog sledding Dolphin Research/Swim Driver‐guide Duck/Dove Hunting Dude Ranch / Farm stay Ecotourism/Ecology Elephant Rides Environmental Education Equestrian Tours Executives Exposition Extreme Sports FIT's Family Groups/Tours Fantasy Tours/Flights Farmhouses Fashion Tours Festival Tours Fiesta Bowl Film/Film History Fishing / Fly Fishing Fitness Flight Seeing Fly‐in Charters Fly/Drive Packages Foliage Tours Football Four‐Wheel Drive Fox/Stag Hunting Gambling Garden Tours Gay/Lesbian Tours Gem Collecting Genealogy Geology Ghost Towns Glacier Tours Goat Packing Gold Panning Golf Golf Tournaments Gorilla Viewing Gourmet Grandparent/Grandchild Tours Group Tours Guest Ranches Handicapped Hang Gliding/Soaring Health & Fitness Heli‐Rafting Heli‐Skiing Heli‐Trekking Helicopter Tours Hiking Historic Houses History Tours Hockey Holistic Health Home Stay/Exchange Honeymoons Horse Breeding

Horse Carriage Tours Horse Racing Riding/Packing/Trek Horticulture Hotels Houseboating Hovercrafting Hunting Ice Climbing Iceberg Viewing Icefishing Incentive Travel Investment Island Cottage Rentals Island Resorts/Vacations Jeep Safaris Jet Boat Expeditions Jet Skiing Jewish Tours Jungle Expeditions Jungle Lodges Kon‐Tiki Rafting Kosher Tours/Cruises Language Study Learning Legends Lewis & Clark Trail Literary Tours Llama Packing Magazines Marine Biology Martial Arts Medicine Meditation Meetings Metaphysical Military History Millennium Tours Mine Tours Motorcamping/Camper Motorcoach Tours Motorcycle Rental Motorcycle Tours Motorhome Tours Mountain Bike Tours Mountaineering/ Multisport Museum Tours Mushroom Hunting Music Mystery Tours Myth & Folklore National Parks Native Americans Natural History Nature Reserves Nature Trips New Year's Eve Ball Non‐Smokers Tours Northern Lights Viewing Nudist Resorts/Cruises Oenology/Wine Study Oktoberfest Olympic Games Opera Outdoor Skills School Outings Overlanding Painting Paleontology Paragliding Penguin Viewing People over 50 Tours Perfumery Tours Photographic Tours Photography Events Pilgrimage/Mythology Pioneer Skills

Polar Bear Watching Polar Expeditions Porcelain/China/Pottery Professional Study RV Rentals Railway Trips Rainforest Ranching Real Estate Reindeer Safaris Religion Research Expeditions Restoration Retreats River Cruises River Rafting Rock Climbing Rodeos Rose Bowl Running/Jogging Safari/Game Viewing Sailing Schools Sailing Charters School Visits Scuba/Snorkeling Sea Kayaking Sea Turtle Watching Seaplane Services Self‐drive Tours Seminars Seniors/Retired Shamanism Shipwrecks Shopping Shore/Cruise Excursions Single Travelers Skiing Cross Country Skiing Downhill Skydiving Snowboarding Snowmobiling Snowshoeing Soccer Solar Eclipse Tours Solar/Alternative Energy Spa/Hot Springs Special Interest Spirituality Spectator Sports Spelunking Spiritual Tours Sports Camps Sports Tours Stress Management Student Tours Study Tours Sugar Bowl Summer Camps Super Bowl Surfing Swimming Tea Tours Teachers' Tours Tennis Textile Arts Theatre Tourist Guides Trekking Truffle Hunting Ultra Light Flying University Tours Vegetarian Tours Veterans Videography Tours Villa / Chateau Rentals Vintage Aircraft Vintage Cars Volcano Tours

Volleyball Walking Tours Walrus Watching Waterskiing Weddings Weekend Escapes Whale Watching Whisky/Distillery Tours Wilderness Courses Wilderness Lodges Wilderness Vacations Wildflower Viewing Wildlife Wimbledon Windjamming Windsurfing Wine Tasting Winery Tours Women's Tours World Cup World Series Writing Workshops Yacht Charter Bareboat Yacht Charter Crewed Yoga Youth Zoology Zorbing

CIRCLE THE NICHE MARKETS THAT APPEAL TO YOU AND THEN MAKE NOTE OF THEM BELOW.

NEXT, LIST YOUR TOP THREE IN ORDER OF PERFERENCE. 1. ____________ 2. ____________ 3. ____________ Once you have your list, consider the Power of 3. Is there anyway you can generate three versions of these niche markets? Let your creativity flow here and see how many more niche ideas you can list.

YOU JUST NEVER KNOW! AFTER ALL, YOU ARE SELLING THE WORLD AND THE WORLD SHE DOES CHANGE. WHAT WAS, NOW ISN’T. ANYTIME THERE IS A GLOBAL HICCUP, IT AFFECTS YOUR BUSINESS AND MORE SO, IT AFFECTS, OR COULD AFFECT YOUR NICHE MARKET. SO WHAT TO DO? THE ANSWER LIES IN THE POWER OF 3.

You know where you live and you know where you sell to. Chances are you check each day what’s going on around the world that might affect your business. For instance at the moment the cruise industry is under scrutiny and recent television reports have perhaps shaken a few first time cruise clients. There are reports on certain destinations as not being safe due to gang and drug related violence. There’s always the potential danger of weather rising up to tell us that mother nature is in total control of the planet, not us. When these things happen you need a Plan B prepared. When you work with the Power of 3 in mind, your Plan B would be working and so you don’t have to ‘resort to it’ you just move more business to it. Here’s how it works. Let’s work on a Wine Tourism niche. Now, if you have one product, one destination and something happens at that destination your wine tourism niche could be corked! When you operate a wine tourism niche market you will be going to countries that produce the wine you are most interested in.

You might also offer wine tours to countries that are far apart so that if anything happens in one country, the other two destinations are not affected. We’ll choose France, Germany and Italy. How’s that? Might sound good, however what if all of Europe is affected by the worst weather ever and the grape harvest is nil. The answer is in The Power of 3. You could offer California, South Africa, Australia, Chile, Canada… as your other two destinations over an above Europe or one country in Europe. When one country or area or region suffers, you have the other two to support your niche market. Now you can apply The Power of 3 to any niche. What about Faith Based Tours. Most are focused on the Christian faith and related cities and countries. Your other two, could include other religions such as Buddhism and that would take you to India, Japan, China… far away from Europe should, once again, something happen in Europe to prevent your tours filling. Many religious people are interested in other religions – so here then is another angle for you to think about and build into your Power of 3 plan. Offer three religions to three different areas of the world and your niche market should be well protected from the global rise and fall of politics, weather and acts of someone’s god.

Hi Honey! What took you so long?

THEY’RE EVERYWHERE! THEY’RE EVERYWHERE! YOU JUST HAVE TO FIND THEM THAT’S ALL! AND THERE LIES THE FUN AND THE TOUR.

I’ve written in the past about Ancestral Tourism and how this trend is still trending and becoming a world wide activity. Everyone of a certain age seems to want to know more about their ancestors. At the time of writing this page, there is a new series of “Who Do You Think You Are?” on Friday night TV. This show is funded by Ancestry.com and that would mean there’s no doubt some serious coin to be had in finding one’s old and long gone rellies. I’m partial to the term “Deep Ancestry” and one or two travel agencies and tour companies have gone after this market to create a fantastic niche for those who want to tour back in time to Africa and the places “we” ‐ that’s a world‐wide collective Royal we – where we, our ancestors, made the great exodus from 60,000 years ago, give or take a year. National Geographic has taken on the role of investigating deep ancestry through it’s Genographic Project. You can participate by sending in your one‐ hundred bucks USD and then after you receive your DNA kit, you swab and send it back. Three weeks later, you’ll have your route out of Africa. It’s a thrilling thing to do. It’s exciting as you wait, and wait some more, check on line, then wait some more. You can build yourself into a bit of a frenzy if you’re not careful. Then one day, bingo! Your chart has arrived. So now you must imagine clients of yours who have also just received their Genographic chart and wondering about a trip to Africa. Hmm?

MARKETING TO THE ANCESTOR HUNTER So here’s how you can start to attract those that share your niche interest. q After each episode of shows like “Who Do You Think You Are?” – you advertise in your local community paper, and mention your tours on your Facebook page too. q Next, you could engage the services of a professional rellie‐hunter, known as a genealogist and promote your new service that would be: helping your clients track down their long lost cousins AND then, you arrange their trip overseas to tour the village, walk the streets and take rubbings of headstones. This is a combination offer. You offer to find their ancestors and then handle the FIT arrangements. You will need to assess the hourly fee for your new partner’s expertise. Your genealogist might charge $30 to $50 per hour so you’ll either receive a percentage of that fee or you’ll add your percentage on top of it. If you are living in a place that you immigrated to, then your “old country” is probably one place that you can generate ancestry tours to. That’s a good start. After that, or before if you are confident in your skills, you can market your tours world wide. Now before you do that, check to see if any tour operators exist. No need to reinvent the wheel. You can always work with the existing tour company and make changes to selected itineraries. There is another opportunity too and that’s helping visitors to your area find their relatives. Local ancestry tours are also good money earners. Start now. Google “Ancestry Tours” and see what pops up.

“Get ahead of ordinary!”

As a kid I would dream of ‘darkest Africa’ and more so when I read Edgar Rice Burroughs books about Tarzan of the Apes. From those young years I changed continents and in my teen years I was fixated on Japan. This love affair with Japan came through my initiation into the sport of Judo and other martial arts at age 11. During mid teen years I joined my school’s outward bound program arranged in the summer months and during those years I learned to hike, camp, climb, ridge walk, scree run, pothole, kayak, canoe then at 16 I left school, found a job with Horizon Holidays based in London, UK. At 18 I wanted to see the world and the only way at that time to see the world and be paid to do it, was to join the Merchant Navy. By the ripe old age of 19 I had circumnavigated the world. At 21 I emigrated to Canada. Life for me has always been about the next adventure and so when the time was right I opened a travel agency called The Charter Place and focused on adventure travel or ‘weird stuff’ as most travel agents refered to it then as they sent their Himalayan bound clients to me.

If you want to sell adventure travel and create a niche market for yourself you should probably be out there doing what it is you intend to focus on. You could be all things to all adventurers or you could focus on one or two related activities. The safest route in a business sense would be to stick to the ‘soft adventure’ trips. Safaries and hiking and walking tours would be included here. Also included in the soft adventure list would be any outdoor activity that isn’t life threatening. Mind you, sitting in the woods on a game trail could result in a confrontation with Mr. Bear! North American Adventures Many of your clients can enjoy an adventure without leaving the North American continent. So that’s a good selling point. When you take a look at Canada and America as a land mass of opportunity there’s everything your adventuresome clients (and you) could ever hope for. Name it and it’s here. Somewhere.

Look closely at the signatures on the ceiling of the Pen y Gwryd in Snowdonia, North Wales and you will see the signatures of famous mountain climbers. Visiting this room is a highlight for all mountaineers.

Going further afield you can offer your clients any of those soft adventure programs throughout the UK, Europe and over to Japan, China and elsewhere around the world. At certain points however, the adventure ratchets up a notch or two and this is due to the fitness level, the danger level and of course the actual location itself. For those, like me, who always had a dream of being on Everest, but not a hope in the world of achieving that, I could be a candidate for a fly over, a fly past, a look up from the foot hills… any soft adventure that would get me closer to the real one. Many of your clients would go for this. Always ask your clients, no matter who, “What is your dream adventure for this lifetime?” The answers will astound you, and they will give you something to work on, too. Many of those dreams can be satisfied right out of a brochure. The others you would have to engage your FIT skills. The Come With Me Promotion Another way to get yourself recognized as an adventure agent is to invite clients along.

If you are the hiker, biker, walker, climber or you love to fish – whatever it is there will be a dozen others who would like to join you on YOUR adventure – and that’s how you market it. The “Join Me…” headline is always catchy and when you state your credentials related to the adventure you are planning, you will attract those like minded clients who will travel with you because it’s YOU and because you know what you are doing and where you are going. Adventure Specialist Training Perhaps you would like a few letters after your name and if you feel these will help you close more sales then it’s a good thing to go for. You may also want to take in this Adventure Travel Summit. https://www.adventuretravel.biz/connect/summit/

Certified Adventure Travel Specialist Program Look for local or online training that will give you the credentials you need and want. Here’s one example:

http://catsagents.com/

Be sure to sign up for this newsletter too. http://www.adventuretravelnews.com/

The Adventure Tourism Market Report and other publications can be found at the XOLA Consulting site shown below. http://www.xolaconsulting.com/Adventure‐Market‐2010.pdf

Check Your Passion Here See anything that you like? Anything you could sell? There is another list in this issue of Selling Travel so be sure to look for it. It has over 250 activities listed. q Backpacking q Ballooning q Bicycling q Bird watching q Bungee Jumping q Camping q Canoeing q Diving q Dog sledding q Fishing q Four Wheel Drive q Hang gliding q Hiking q Horseback Riding q Kayaking q Mountain Biking q Mountain Climbing q Nature Trips q Orienteering q Paragliding q Rafting q Rappelling q Safaris q Sailing q Snorkelling q Skiing q Snow shoeing q Skydiving q Spelunking q Walking Tours q Trekking Once you find your adventure activity niche, then you must research destinations, work with your chosen suppliers to establish a rapport and plan your first Come With ME! Trip. Remember what George Mallory said in response to why he climbed Everest? He said “Because it’s there!” and there’s your cue as to why you should sell adventure travel!

SELLING CRUISES IN A POST CONCORDIA WORLD Since the Concordia tragedy the media have been all over this event as they strive to tell us what happened and to also, as they do, go over the top with their statements and projections. In seeking to hype the situation to gain more eyes and ears they forget that there is an entire village of small business owners and operators call travel agencies who make their living selling this product. Cruising is still one of the best types of vacations you can sell. That said, you might need to change tactics a little. You’ll need to decide if now is a good time to invest in a cruise promotion. Since the Concordia capsize there has been reports of Norovirus, a passenger going overboard and who knows what’s next. Whatever it is, the media will be all over it. So what to do if cruising is your niche? Well first off you must have all hands on deck. That means if you run an agency, you’ll need your agency team all saying the same thing when cruise clients ask questions about safety etc. Next you’ll want to be promoting cruising in a way that does not argue against what the mass media is putting out – but you do want to make statements that cause the reader to think past the media headlines. Mass media is too large to take on and that’s not what you want to do. What you do want to do is to own the news that’s reaching your own clients. That you can take on and control. With deep water cruising getting a media bashing perhaps it’s time to stay the course but also take a side trip, a small adventure into other forms of cruising, such as river cruising and barging. You may find that serious deep water cruisers are ready for a break anyway.

They might just be at that point where they want to do something different but similar. The core ingredient is being on the water. So river cruising is a perfect fit and once they scale down from 4,000 fellow pax to 200… well now, they might have found nirvana! Then there’s small boat cruising, there’s adventure cruises, barging in Europe and the UK and wonderful luxury yachts if that suits someone’s wallet. It’s very much a time you need to get your ships together and decide on a course of action as the deep water cruise industry rights itself. You’ll know from being in the trade that the airline industry has had it’s fair share of tough times and they are still with us. The same thing will happen for the cruise industry. That said, as the captain of your own universe it is YOU that must make a change in course and steer your business into open water, away from the storm and into a very nice trough of revenues. Next step: change your deep water messaging and posters etc to promote river cruising or similar. If you are more than a cruise‐only agency then market tours to somewhere and quickly if you want to attract a new client base. At the same time you must continue talking cruise to your existing die hard cruise clients. Don’t lose them.

THERE ARE WHAT, 200 COUNTRIES IN THE WORLD? ALRIGHT THEN, 195! HOW MANY? NOW I’M GETTING A NOD FOR 210. SHEESH, DOES ANYONE HAVE A TRUE COUNT? MAYBE NOT. SO I’M GOING WITH THE 195 TO 200 NUMBER.

That there is your challenge. Choosing which country to focus sell which means a certain country will become your overall niche. Which in turn means you will know everything, repeat everything about this country and you will be able to articulate your knowledge clearly and concisely. It also means you have travelled there many times. You might even be from there and still able to speak, read and write the language. As you research the idea of focus selling one country you will find many more travel agents who do just that. You will see their promotional campaigns advising the consumer and stating the country that the agency specializes in. There are benefits to selling one country. First thing is that you’ll become recognised by the tourism authorities of that country and more than likely if you ask, you might just win support funding for your marketing. Working with selected tour operators and giving them all your business will also bode well for you. You commission levels might just rise a point or two.

Other than ‘back home’ think about the country that attracts you, pulls you in on an emotional level. If there is a country that does this to you, then chances are, this is the one you’ll want to sell. Study it. Learn about it. Go there many times. Video it. Shoot thousands of images. One way to find out if you have grasped the essence of the country that inspires you is to write about it. See how much flows from your mouse. Stand back and admire it. Try writing a 50 page guide to your chosen niche destination. That will tell you something about your level of knowledge.

The Next Best Thing What if no country grabs you? Okay, in that case you must check up on who is going where and going in groups. As you know, various countries fill up with tourists at certain times of year. Most years, it seems that France receives the most visitors. See the chart below from 2010. You can find it here at this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Tourism_rankings

Common Mistakes I have worked with more than one agency owner who believes that everyone in the local community would want to see where they are from. Many of these agency owners had invested tens of thousands of dollars building a campaign, blocking seats, arranging tours, all on spec, and then sadly, no‐one booked on their tour. The fact was, main stream tour operators were also selling that country / destination. They had it packaged. The agency owner should have worked with these tour operators versus going it alone. Just Because You Are From There… Many of us live “here” having immigrated from “there”. We might feel we know our old country so well, that we could lead tours to ‘back home’. The fact is, unless you truly travelled your own country from top to bottom, visited most museums, theatre, libraries and studied the history from zero to now… you don’t know your own country. You might know the local area around where you were born, but that’s not deep enough to sell ‘back home’ as a niche.

If you’re seeing what I’m seeing, we’re both looking at your next and very focused niche destination. Any one of these destinations then would serve as your new niche market. Which one will it be? Ten countries – all popular. At least we’ve narrowed the choices down from 195 to 10. Not bad going over two pages. Your job is not done yet. You can imagine that 99% of travel agents sell top ranked France and sell the usual fare: coach tours. What if you were to introduce something else? Wine, cycling, culinary, old villages, walking tours… they are already available but not every agency is selling them as they focused on coach tours. This means you are in with a chance. Over to you. First find that passion for a country and if nothing happens, you can throw a dart at a world map, or, go with the facts from this chart. Bon chance!

SELLING TRAVEL is on a sales mission. That’s it pure and simple. Any and all SELLING TRAVEL services are focused on generating new business for you and your agency. The missing link between marketing, sales and closing that sale is generally a lack of experience, know‐how and creativity. SELLING TRAVEL CAN SHOW YOU HOW Be sure to subscribe to the eMagazine and join the list.

CONFERENCE KEYNOTES Fast paced, humourous, excellent imagery and delivered with a street‐savvy, no‐fluff and little theory format. Click 4 More.

WEBINARS & WORKSHOPS Webinar’s are a SELLING TRAVEL specialty. Running 75 to 90 minutes, they include a workbook plus 30 minutes of post webinar time with me AND a 5‐day review of the webinar recording for additional note taking. Click here for details.

PUBLICATIONS The ultimate desk reference for TAs. With 412 pages, covering 273 marketing ideas + 700 links to additional information. Order today from Big Bark Graphics – Enter the Big Bark Store here. Now available in e‐Book format from The Travel Institute.

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Read sample copy here

SELF‐STUDY GUIDES AVAILABLE FROM CITC

412 PAGES 273 IDEAS 100s of VARIATIONS 700 LINKS TO MORE RESOURCES When you need a source of ideas to either implement as is, or to help jog your own creative juices, this is the book to buy. It took me over 25 years to get it ‘here’ and that story is on page 5. It was some journey. When I started writing it, the IBM Selectric was the word processor of choice! What a laugh. Some suppliers have purchased a copy for each of their Business Development Managers, host agencies have made bulk purchases for their members and individual agents have written in to say this book is their idea bible.

WHEN YOU BUY THIS BOOK YOU WILL RECEIVE 2 HOURS OF IDEA TIME WITH THE AUTHOR AND 10% OFF YOUR FIRST STATIONERY ORDER WHEN PURCHASED THROUGH BIG BARK GRAPHICS EASY TO USE E-STORE!

It also, as you can see, comes in pill form, a cure for the common creative block! Okay, just kidding, but it is available in E‐BOOK format if you prefer to read it on screen! For e‐Books: steve@sellingtravel.net

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HEY MORE GREAT NEWS… Well that was quick. Last month I tell you I’ve Joined TTI and the next thing is I’m presenting a webinar on April 2nd, 2012. So thanks to the team at The Travel Institute I look forward to bringing my Training A‐Game to all TTI members and non‐members. Check below for more information and click HERE to register. OVER 200 AGENTS

MONDAY APRIL 2nd 2012

REGISTERED FOR THE TRAVEL WRITING FOR TRAVEL AGENTS Webinar held on January 27th 2012

What can I say! TTI did a wonderful job of marketing this webinar and we had over 200 registrations with accolades to follow!

FREE to TTI members. Non‐members pay a small fee of USD $19.99

… and also coming in April, a brand new webinar on, well, webinars! “Webinar Marketing for Travel Agents” It’s the new way to engage and sell your clients.

The SELLING TRAVEL COMMUNITY. This is where travel agents help travel agents by sharing their sales successes and how they made it happen.

So if you have some neat sales and marketing ideas that have paid off for you… now you can share them with your travel agent colleagues around the world.

When you get a chance, click to the social page on the Selling Travel website and join in. Here’s the link to that page: www.sellingtravel.net/social.html You can also share your profile, make recommendations and get involved with special events when they’re announced.

You can also share here: www.facebook.com/sellingtravel

Google Friend Connect

If you have a website and you would like to establish your own social network, just for your clients you can do this using Google Friend Connect. It’s a very simple type, copy, paste event – all you need to have access to on your website is a place where you can paste in a few lines of HTML code that Google creates for you. You can also use this application to create a community for a specialty niche market, or a tour group. How you use Google Friend Connect is only as limited as your imagination. So fire it up, get thinking and see where and how you can make use of this free tool. Test it out on Selling Travel. Click HERE and go sign up, upload your photo, add your profile and check out all the other ST COMMUNITY ideas we’re coming up with. If you want a more full‐on social site then you can research sites such as www.socialgo.com . There are many others however this one will give you the idea and concept. As always there is a low priced format, a mid range and a top notch one too. For twenty‐bucks a month you can have a pro‐social site and build it using all the features you see & use on Facebook.

SocialGo offers a service for $299 and they set it all up for you. They create all your social links, website layout and design and then hand it back to you.

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www.sellingtravel.net T: 250-752-0106 steve@sellingtravel.net